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Leadership is not a rocket science. Leadership concept is ‘mini me’ so bullying leaders creates more bullies around him/her but a good leader creates more good leaders around him/her. In our NHS where there is ‘Club culture’ Old boy’s network, discrimination, bullying and so on, we do not appoint right leaders. This culture is more rife amongst medical and nursing profession. One has to simply look at the diversity of leaders in many Trust, Colleges and even the Commissioning Board!

Sadly there is no true equality and diversity. So many good doctors and nurses with excellent leadership skills are not nurtured, encouraged to take on leadership roles and many get fed up and lose interest in being and becoming leaders.

Having been a Medical Director and taken many leadership roles in the NHS, I can only speak for doctors. I am convinced that sadly only 10% of our doctors have true leadership skills and by not encouraging women and BME doctors with true leadership skills we are losing out on nearly 10,000 good doctors with fantastic leadership skills from taking active part in leadership like Clinical Directors, Divisional Medical Directors and eventually becoming Medical Directors.

Leadership is about intimacy and good relation with our staff and making them feel valued, involved, engaged, nurtured and supported. It is about working with them putting patients at the heart of everything we do and having safety culture, supportive and learning culture, moving away from ‘blame culture and a culture of accountability for all including the leaders and providing the best, safe and effective care to all our patients. Leadership is the key and leaders should only be appointed for their merit and all leaders should be performance managed for their behaviour, values and beliefs and should have feedback from everyone who is affected by their leadership.

Organisational leadership, culture and energy are the key to the success or the failure of the organisation. Leaders should only be appointed on merit and nothing else.